June 12, 2015

Summertime music

Even though my husband and I keep talking about empty nest syndrome, our home isn't actually empty yet. My youngest son, With-a-Why, still lives here. (Long-time readers will be shocked to hear that he's twenty years old. Yes. Twenty!) Most days, his girlfriend Shy Smile hangs out here as well. Oh, and they have a friend, Curly Hair, who needed a place to stay for the summer so we invited her to move into one of our upstairs bedrooms.

And all my kids still live nearby. My oldest son Boy-in-Black, who comes here often to spend time with With-a-Why, set up a badminton court in the backyard: that's his obsession when he's not playing Ultimate Frisbee. My daughter comes over every evening to "train" with With-a-Why: he's teaching her to play Starcraft, a computer game that he's apparently quite good at. I usually see my son Shaggy Hair Boy on Tuesdays, since we split the veggies and fruit we get from our CSA farm. He's a ninth grade math teacher, who teaches at one school all day and then puts in a couple of hours every evening at another school; he won't be done for the summer for another week or two.

The house is less like an empty nest and more like a train station where people come and go: you never know who might be here. I no longer have a teenage boy band jamming in my living room —yes, we gave away the drum set — but we still have live music since With-a-Why is a classical pianist. He's also decided that he wants to learn how to tune a piano, which means that some days I come home to find the top of the piano off and his tools spread out on the floor. The piano tuning was going along quite well until he broke a string. Now he's learning how to replace a piano string.

One of With-a-Why's summer projects is to learn the cello. He figures that every composer needs to know a string instrument, and the cello is his favourite. So he rented a cello, and sits down every day to practice. Already he's beginning to play recognizable tunes.

I've always lived with live music in the house. My father plays jazz, and when I was growing up, he and his friends would often jam in the house. Once With-a-Why graduates from college and leaves home, I might have to start taking piano lessons again myself, just to have music in the house.

12 comments:

WOW!!! With-a-Why was ten when you started to blog and my son L was n infant!!! We have come a long way...

OK, so who's getting a phd on the same discipline as my husband, Boy-in-Black? For some reason I thought it was Shaggy Hair boy, but you're saying that he's a teacher -- he's the one getting married in August, right? Is Smiley Girl a teacher too?

So is With-a-Why majoring in music? It's awesome that he's tuning the piano, I took a piano technology class (tuning, changing strings, things like that when I was in grad school -- it was an undergrad night class -- but I obviously cannot do any of these things). I hope the string changing went ok! If you have the right tools it's not that bad. At least in a grand piano which is what I was dealing with in that class.

L: Yep, that's right. Here are my kids in order of age: Beautiful Smart Wonderful Daughter is a clinical psychologist. Boy-in-Black is a physicist. Shaggy Hair Boy is a math teacher, and he'll be marrying Smiley Girl, who is a science teacher. And my youngest, With-a-Why, is majoring in music.

Andrew: My older kids have busy lives so it's not actually that convenient for them to come here, but they come often to spend time with their youngest brother — and because they know I love it when they're home. My parents live six miles away, and I stop by their house often because I know that they love seeing me. We're a close family.

You have been blogging a long while! How wonderful that your kids are close at hands. Ours are still in state but not "handy" and we miss them more than we can say! Sounds like a hub of energy in your world. How lovely!

Liz: I know! It's a shock to me too. I don't have any teenagers any more. My kids (and my extra kids) are starting to get married, finish PhD's, get real jobs, buy houses, and all of those grown-up things. Where did the time go?